Japan Places API

Start in 30 seconds

The free endpoints need no key and no registration. Replace the prefecture to change the query:

curl "https://koteihi-lab.local-connect-design.trade/api/v1/poi/municipality?prefecture=%E6%9D%B1%E4%BA%AC"

That returns POI counts by category for Tokyo. Paid endpoints return 402 Payment Required with the exact price and a payment header before you pay anything.

The five derived signals

Pricing

Attribution is required on every response at every tier. The three paid datasets are unlocked by the RapidAPI feature "Premium Datasets" (Basic: off, Pro/Ultra/Mega: on). Pay-per-use over x402 is available for the three paid datasets. Support is documentation-first and fully self-service: the OpenAPI spec, llms.txt and every error response are the complete reference, and there is no human support. Refunds for RapidAPI subscriptions are handled by RapidAPI support.

Subscriptions are billed on RapidAPI. Micropayments are USDC on Base. No monthly minimum on the pay-as-you-go tier. RapidAPI takes a 25% marketplace fee, so a $150 MEGA plan pays out $112.50.

Pay per call with x402 (no account, no API key)

1. Call a paid endpoint. You get 402 with accepts[] describing the scheme, network, asset, amount, and pay-to address.
2. Sign a USDC (Base) transfer authorization for that amount.
3. Retry with the PAYMENT-SIGNATURE header. If the facilitator verifies it, you get the data.

Nothing is charged before step 2, and the amount is fixed in the 402 response.

For AI agents (MCP + x402)

Streamable HTTP MCP endpoint at /mcp with the same five signals. Paid tools return a payment_required result that includes the PAYMENT-REQUIRED header, so an agent can sign and pay in one round trip.

claude mcp add --transport http japan-places https://koteihi-lab.local-connect-design.trade/mcp

Bundled offline server (data inside the package, no network required):

npx -y @modelcontextprotocol/server-japan-places

Machines: /llms.txt is the machine-readable API description.

License: easier than the free alternatives

• Free tier is CC BY 4.0. Commercial use, storage, caching, modification, and redistribution are all permitted.
• Unlike some map/place APIs, you may keep the results in your own database.
• Keep the per-record licenses and attributions arrays when you store records, and display the attribution link on any surface showing the data.
• Paid tier is the same data and the same permissions, with higher limits and payment.

Full chain of upstream licenses (Overture Maps, 81 municipal datasets, MLIT, e-Stat, Japan Post) with what we changed: attribution.

What this cannot tell you

11.3% of records are unclassified upstream, some coordinates drift, and closed shops persist until the weekly rebuild. We publish the exact numbers and the filters that handle each case: known limitations.

Clients and references

• OpenAPI 3.0 specification
• Python client and TypeScript client
• Changelog (breaking changes flagged, 90-day overlap)
• Status (live health and dataset freshness)
• Terms and privacy — includes the automatic full-refund policy

Use cases